339 



formation of this gravel, by that transient and universal 

 inundation which has left traces of its ravages committed at 

 no very distant period over the surface of the whole globe, 

 and since which no important or general physical changes 

 appear to have affected it. 



" Both in the case of the English and German caverns, 

 the bones under consideration are never included in the 

 solid rock ; they occur in cavities of limestone rocks of 

 various ages and formations, but have no further connexion 

 with the rocks themselves, than that arising from the acci- 

 dent of their being lodged in cavities produced in them by 

 causes wholly unconnected with the animals, that appear 

 for a certain time to have taken possession of them as their 

 habitation."* 



We cannot quit these monuments of former worlds 

 without alluding to the incontrovertible evidence they pre- 

 sent of the exercise of Almighty Power and of the perpetual 

 influence of a Divine Providence. 



In the several formations composing the outer part of 

 the earth down to the primitive rocks, vast accumulations 

 exist of the fossil remains of organized beings, varying in 

 each formation, and essentially differing from those beings 



* The hyaena's habit of digging human bodies from the grave, 

 and dragging them to their den, and accumulating around it the 

 bones of all kinds of animals, is thus described by Busbequius, in 

 speaking of the Turkish custom of laying great stones on their 

 graves to guard them from the hyaenas : — 



" Hyaena regionibus iis satis frequens ; sepulchra suffodit, extra- 

 hitque cadavera, portatque ad suam speluncam ; juxta quam videri 

 est ingentem cumulum ossium humanorum, veterinariorum et reli- 

 quorum omne genus animalium." — Ley. Tare. Epist. 1. 



